Prospero Regained (65 page)

“Can it do that?” Titus gaped at the rod in Gregor’s hands, so recently his.

Gregor commanded, “Staff, do as he has instructed.”

The noises of the greater battle fell silent. Theo fired, and we watched the expanding blossom of white flame unfold soundlessly among the enemy, slaughtering an untold number. The wind from the explosions swept back upon us, blowing some of the smaller imps and goblins away.

Titus shook his head, chuckling. “Why do they even bother when Theophrastus is against them?”

A large demon with the head of a reptile leapt over Mab’s barrier. Titus took him out with a single powerful swing.

Agares, the Duke of the East, an old man on the back of a giant crocodile carrying a goshawk, came riding out from amidst the enemy’s ranks. He raised his fist, and all the imps and cacodemons near him froze in place, as did Theo, Cornelius, and Ulysses. When the ripple of Agares’s effect struck the wall of silence, it stopped. Angry, the old man stamped his foot, and the ground shook. Before him, the earth parted, and a fissure came rumbling toward us, splitting Mab’s chalk circle. Father and I jumped to safety. Mab and the others were nowhere to be seen, separated from us by the motion of the battle.

A giant black wolf leapt across the chaotic battlefield. On its back sat the Marquis Andras, a winged man with the head of a black raven, who flourished a shining saber. My heart grew cold. I knew that sword, recalled it from battles fought against demonic enemies long ago. Its name was
Discord.

I watched, helpless, as the wolf-mount loped toward my frozen brothers. The demon Andras rode straight at Theophrastus, his great enemy; for Theo had sent him back to the inferno the last three times Andres dared to show his raven face upon the daylit world. But Theo was frozen, standing motionless amidst ranks of immobile demons. He held his staff with both hands, his head thrown back in furious laughter.

I screamed and started running forward, but there was no way to reach him in time. Nor could I call to Mephistopheles, who was near him in the fray, because the wall of silence stopped my voice from reaching that far.

After all we had gone through, I was going to lose Theo!

I stood, screaming with fury. How I missed my staff! Without it, there was nothing I could do. As the Marquis Andras raised the sword
Discord
to slice my beloved brother’s head from his shoulders, I glared at the demon, all my hatred, pain, and frustration rising in my heart.

Andres opened his bird mouth and fell from his mount to the ground, where he lay writhing in spasms. Amazed, I touched my forehead and then yanked my fingers away again, for they now felt slightly numb. Closing my eyes, I “saw” the beam coming from my forehead had taken on a reddish hue. Instead of life and strength flowing from the mark into the demon, its life and strength were being sucked out and flowing into the mark on my forehead.

So this is what the
Book of the Sibyl
had meant by:
Where the Sibyl disdains, Love is withdrawn. Without Love, life flees
.

I glared at another demon near Theo, a great horned creature with bat wings and a scorpion’s tail. His face contorted in horror, and he slumped upon his mount, a fiery dragon. A demon with peacock wings fell writhing to the ground. Another, with the head of an owl, exploded into a puff of razor-sharp feathers.

Any demon who came near my frozen brothers, I destroyed by the force of my wrath alone. Elation bubbled up within me as my enemies fell.

Only a fool would anger a Sibyl
indeed!

As my wrath turned to joy, I concentrated upon my love for my brother Theophrastus, thinking about what the battle must seem like from his perspective. Sure enough, Theo twitched and began to move. Using the same method, I quickly freed Ulysses and Cornelius as well. Immediately, Ulysses began to slaughter the demons frozen around them, putting a bullet directly between each target’s eyes.

My brothers looked terrible. Sweat dripped down their faces. Theo had a head wound that poured blood into his eyes. Ulysses was holding his right arm at an odd angle, as if he could not move it. Luckily, he could shoot just as well with his left hand. Gregor was bleeding from multiple wounds. Something had chopped through his enchanted red robes. Caliban was limping, his left leg a bloody mess.

Nor was it just us. The noble mammoth who uncomplaining had carried us across the Glacier of Hate lay upon its side, hamstrung. The chimera’s dragon head had been nearly severed; it hung from its body by a mere thread. Brave Pegasus had lost a wing, and the magnificent roc lay unmoving upon the battlefield.

We were doing so well … but we were losing.

Rapidly, I looked from one dear wounded soul to another, a rush of affection flowing through me. My brothers breathed deeply and fought with renewed strength. Mephisto’s friends stirred and sought to rise. Their wounds did not vanish, but at least any who were not already dead would not perish from these wounds.

The invisible beams of unicorn love filled the battlefield with a holy fragrance, driving the denizens of Hell crazy. Here and there, wildflowers sprang up in the dull substance of Limbo.

Before I could finish, something slithered against my enchanted gown. A dagger held in what must be an invisible hand tried again to stab me. I raised my fan against my attacker, but another invisible demon caught me from behind. Together, the two unseen opponents knocked me sideways, tossing me into the fissure Agares had created.

I was falling.

The walls of the fissure rushed pasat me. I reached for my flute to call for a wind to save me, but, of course, I no longer had a flute. I whistled hopefully, but no one came. Beneath me, rushing ever more quickly toward me, flames danced.

“Seir! Seir!” I shouted.

He did not come.

Panic gripped me. My enchanted tea gown would not protect me from the impact of the fall or from burns to my hands, face, and legs. If this was the same lava that burned Theo and Caliban, remaining calm would help. But we were in Limbo now, not Hell; I did not know if the rules were the same.

I tried flapping my wings but could find no way to manipulate them. I was out of options. Touching my forehead, I thanked my Lady for raising me to the rank of Sibyl before I perished and felt Her love and warmth flow through me in return. I felt certain my family would now be able to regroup and escape. My only regret was I had not had a chance to set Astreus free.

Strong arms embraced me from behind. I caught whiffs of brimstone and an intoxicating masculine scent. My forehead tingled.

“I have caught you, my sweet.” Seir of the Shadows’s laughter suddenly cut off. “Argh! Your wings are burning me.”

“You came!” I whispered.

“Of course, my love, how could it be otherwise? Were you to perish, it would be as if my very self had died.”

I twisted about until I faced him. This seared him briefly but put my wings behind me. Leaning closer, the sable incubus whispered in my ear, “I rescued your brother as you requested. Now, I have come to claim my reward.”

We fell together, plummeting toward the flames. The world turned to darkness, and then, I was standing amidst the swirling mist of Limbo again, to one side of the battle, with the incubus’s arms still wrapped tightly about my waist.

He gestured at my forehead with his head. “This is the reward I seek. To be free.”

“Astreus! I thought you were dead!”

“Love saved me.” The incubus spoke with Astreus’s voice. “Love is stronger than any curse or oath. It is stronger than the waters of the Lethe. Love is the strongest thing in the universe, and nothing in Hell can dim it.”

I looked up into his laughing green eyes and, for an instant, I felt as if I was the one who had resisted the Torturers a thousand years lest I lose my chance at Heaven; as if I was the one who had pursued the White Lady through field and forest, hill and dell, on the faint glimmer of a suggestion that there might be a way to freedom; as if I was the one who had fallen in love with the young woman who bore within her the hope of this promise; as if I was the one who had waited over three hundred years to bring her the key that could set us both free.

Coming back to myself, I would have stumbled backward had he not been holding me so tightly. I swayed in his embrace, a strange tingle running up and down my limbs and making them weak.

All this time, all these years, I had completely misunderstood him. I had ascribed to him every elvish and quixotic motive I could invent. I had doubted his every action, his every word. When all the time, his motives had been entirely plain and straightforward.

Hope
and
love
.

Within me, my heart took flight. It swelled until it seemed too large for my body, too large for the unending cavern of Limbo, too large for all of space and time. Only Heaven was large enough to encompass it now.

Touching two fingers to my forehead, I tapped his shoulder. He jerked, startled. I declared: “I call upon the Sixth Gift of the Sibyl! Astreus Stormwind, I release you from any and all oaths you have ever sworn, to anyone. You are free!”

A cloud of dark snow rose about Seir, accompanied by a faint scent of brimstone. Within the darkness, he grew taller. Then, the air cleared, and Astreus stood in Seir’s ripped opera cloak, his eyes a triumphant violet. We embraced and, laughing, he kissed me again, this time with his own lips, which were as cool and fresh as a winter’s breeze. And I was still there. I had not fallen away into dreams.

Pulling away, I looked up at him from the circle of his arms—for suddenly an idea had struck me, a terrible, wonderful idea. It was an idea so awe-inspiring that just thinking of it caused tremors of heat and cold to shoot across my limbs.

“Astreus,” I asked slowly, “how many elves have been tithed?”

“Altogether?” He tilted back his head, calculating. “Hundreds of millions, if not more.”

“Where are they?”

“Most of them work for Lilith.”

I regarded the hellish host. “Really? You mean they are right here?”

“Many of them, yes.”

“What would happen if I picked one, say that one”—I pointed at an ouphie who was jumping up and down on the back of Mephisto’s Mammoth—“and freed him from his oath to Hell.”

Astreus gazed at me, his attention arrested. His eyes had turned that eerie angelic gold. “He would go free, I expect.”

“Has any Sibyl ever freed an elf?”

“Occasionally. They only seem to stay free for a time. There is some trick to it that I do not know.”

“But they do go free at first?”

“Yes. They do.”

Staring at the raging horde, I whispered hoarsely, “It
couldn’t
be that easy.”

“But what if it is?”

“Well…” I gulped. “There’s only one way to find out.”

Touching my forehead, I pointed at the field of battle. In a loud voice, I cried: “By the power invested in me as a Sibyl of Eurynome”—a lightning bolt flashed across the gloom overhead—“I release all elves, servants of the High Council, fairies, sylphs, bwca, dwarves, salamanders, undine, djinn, oreads, ouphie, oni, and all other elementals and denizens of Fairyland, everywhere, from their oath to the Infernal Powers!
There shall be no more tithe to Hell!
”

Puffs of darkness rose everywhere at once. The smell of brimstone hung thick in the air. Evil peris became pixies. Imps transformed into fairies and winged sprites. Ouphe became sylphs and Aerie Ones. To my left, Mab let out a whoop and threw his hat into the air.

“Hey, look!” he cried, pointing in the direction of the general jubilation and waving with great enthusiasm. “It’s my cousin!”

Not all the troops transformed, but most of those who did were from Lilith’s personal retinue. The newly restored faery folk wreaked havoc with the lines of battle. Laughing, singing, and turning cartwheels, they tumbled away in all directions, dashing about randomly and tripping their comrades.

Astreus threw back his head and laughed with joy, a sound that was very different from the laughter of mortals. “For longer than your sun has burned have I dreamt of this day! Surely, this…”

His voice trailed off as he looked down, frowning. Light streamed from his finger tips.

Raising his hand, Astreus stared in puzzlement at the beams of golden light that sprouted from each finger. As he moved his hand, the five beams were visible against the mists of limbo. Then, holy golden light began to radiate from his eyes, from his mouth, and from every pore of his skin. The opera cloak split down the back as wings unfolded from his shoulders.

Then, a second pair.

And a third, and a fourth, and a fifth, and a sixth and a seventh—until eight pairs of wings had sprouted. By this time, Astreus was fifteen feet tall and clothed in splendor. His face was glorious. In his eyes, I could see the majesty of the night sky, as if the universe itself was contained within him, but one of his many secrets.

Awe paralyzed me. My limbs trembled as if pricked by needle points of holy fire. The bones of my face and jaw vibrated like the plucked string of a harp. I could no more speak or move than I could have melted the ices of Pluto and sent the planet careening from its orbit by an act of will.

On the battlefield, lesser demons and denizens of Fairyland alike turned and fled. Running randomly in their panic, they screamed, “Angel!”

A distance away to the left, my brother Mephisto smacked himself on the forehead. “D’oh! Of course!”

He was in his smaller human form again, bruised and bloody, with all his clothes ripped; however, I could not see any open wounds. He tapped his staff, and I began to imagine a glorious sight.

The imagined became reality: The Archangel Uriel, Regent of the Sun, Protector of Earth, and Lord of the West Quadrant, strode across the battlefield.

Towering more than twenty feet tall, Uriel was clad in armor of shining Urim, too bright to look upon, and a surcoat of purest gold. Over his arm, he carried an enormous shield, which I recognized as the
Shield of Virtue.
Nine pairs of eagles’ wings sprang from his back, and nine halos shed illumination above his head: a golden circle, a ring of blue sky, a ring of fire, moons, stars, a circle of starlight, comets, a ring of sunlight, and constellations. Beholding his face was like beholding the face of God.